


let it go, brother

by IWillNotBeSilenced



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Codependency, Codependent Winchesters, Comfort, Gen, Hurt, Hurt Dean, M/M, Protective Sam Winchester, Season/Series 10, implied wincest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-26
Updated: 2016-06-26
Packaged: 2018-07-18 10:04:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 532
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7310572
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IWillNotBeSilenced/pseuds/IWillNotBeSilenced
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam thinks he can learn a lot from his brother when Dean thinks Sam isn't looking.</p><p>Or, Sam wishes he could be the one to take care of Dean for once.</p>
            </blockquote>





	let it go, brother

Sam thinks he can learn a lot about his brother when Dean thinks Sam isn’t looking; trivial differences that let on how he feels, and more complex actions which require an in depth knowledge of his older brother to understand.  
How his eyes, cold and hard during a hunt, melt to expose endless depths of pain and despair. How the fabric of his shirt jumps slightly over the left side of his chest, evidence that, despite years and thousands of miles worth of heartache and disappointment, his heart still beats, whether or not he wants it to. The way his words bite and tear at the end of a long day, leaving Sam with surface wounds he covers and bears silently because he knows to reveal any pain his brother causes him would hurt Dean even more in the long run.  
At night, after they’ve gone to their separate rooms deep in the bunker, Dean leaves his door ajar as he sleeps to remind himself that if he wakes, he can leave. That he isn’t trapped, and there are still some places that the darkness can’t penetrate. Sam knows this because some nights he lies awake and feels for his brother’s soul in the dark, drawing him to Dean and leading his feet down the corridor, just to check on him.  
Sometimes, when Dean cracks open a bottle of whiskey, more and more frequently now, when the ghosts of the people he has hurt won’t let his mind rest, he sighs, long and low, and his shoulders sag as if the weight resting on them gets that much heavier when the sun goes down. His forehead, so often furrowed with thought or anger, is covered by hands marked by the nature of their work and he draws them across eyes squinted with exhaustion as if he could rub away a hundred sleepless nights with a flick of his wrist.  
Sam wonders if his brother has always been like this. He’s sure he remembers a time when Dean smiled as easy as breathing and was as quick to laugh as he was to shoot a gun. But now, it seems possible that his cynic’s smile and damning words are really as hollow as he would have everyone believe. But a part of Sam hopes that Dean still holds some shred of optimism for his life or that he even covets a future where they can be happy and safe, so far down that he’s forgotten it’s there, buried beneath scar tissue and bruised knuckles.  
Dean is tough and Sam knows this. He’s taken on the Mark of Cain, Purgatory and Hell and came out swinging. But Sam wonders if maybe, one day, his brother will unclench his fists and lay down his gun and come to him. That when all this is finally over, that Sam will be the first person Dean thinks of. And damn, Sam must have given it a lot of thought, because when that day comes, Sam thinks he would pull Dean against him, taking the weight of his brother and that of the world he tries to shoulder alone and say: ‘Let it go, brother. Let it go.’

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Please, let me know what you thought!


End file.
